“The findings of this study1 suggest that a medication for treating nicotine addiction could be effective for reducing sugar consumption. Some media reports have suggested that these findings mean consuming sugar is an addiction, but such reports are misleading because this is not supported by current scientific evidence2,3,4,5. It is well documented that palatable food and drinks (as well as drugs and some behaviours) elicit responses in the brain’s reward pathways. However, the consensus of current scientific evidence and expert opinion do not place food or sugar within the category of substance-related and addictive disorders2,3,4,5.”
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Notes to Editors:
- As the paper1 itself recognises, further work would be warranted to validate the relevance of this study, which used rats, to the treatment of obesity or sugar consumption in humans.
- Past human studies that have focused directly on sucrose (often referred to as table sugar), do not support the claim that sucrose is addictive2.
- Experts from the NeuroFAST Consortium3 have recently produced a Consensus opinion on food addiction stating “there is no evidence that a specific food, food ingredient or food additive causes a substance based type of addiction” with the exception of caffeine.
- In a 2015 report, looking at reducing sugar consumption, Public Health England4 state “PHE is not aware of evidence that indicates sugar is addictive in the same way as tobacco, alcohol and other drugs of abuse. The sugar addiction hypothesis is largely based on feeding studies conducted in animals and findings from these studies cannot be generalised to the complex eating patterns of humans.”
References
- Shariff M, Quik M, Holgate J, Morgan M, Patkar OL, et al. (2016) Neuronal Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor Modulators Reduce Sugar Intake. PLoS ONE 11(3): e0150270. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0150270
- Benton, D. (2010) The plausibility of sugar addiction and its role in obesity and eating disorders. Clin Nutr, 29, 288-303
- NeuroFAST (2015) http://www.neurofast.eu/consensus(accessed 23/11/15)
- Public Health England (2015) Sugar reduction: Responding to the challenge. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/324043/Sugar_Reduction_Responding_to_the_Challenge_26_June.pdf (accessed 20/4/16)
- Blundell Cecilia G. Long, John E. Blundell, Graham Finlayson. (2015) A Systematic Review of the Application And Correlates of YFAS-Diagnosed ‘Food Addiction’ in Humans: Are Eating-Related ‘Addictions’ a Cause for Concern or Empty Concepts? Obesity Facts; 8: 386–401
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